


Jack's Staff

by the_writer



Category: Rise of the Guardians (2012)
Genre: Cute, Gen, How Jack Got His Staff, I got the idea while writing my other story, Jack's Staff, Timeline of Jack's Staff, Why Did I Write This?
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-06-24
Updated: 2015-06-24
Packaged: 2018-04-05 21:36:38
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,432
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4195785
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/the_writer/pseuds/the_writer
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>A short one shot of how Jack's staff started out as a simple tree branch to a loved companion to the infamous spirit named Jack Frost.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Jack's Staff

I remember the day I was created. 

I was once a branch of a great tree, biggest in the forest. Small children would climb the tree I was born from, often playing games from its heights, grubby small feet and dirty moccasins wore my bark away until I was smooth and became the perfect place for the bigger kids to sit upon. The girls would carve special things for potlucks and trades. The boys would talk about certain things going on in the nearby tribe they belonged to. I was happy there, that I could be useful. But, all good things had to come to an end. I remember the boys speaking of a strange spread of disease from other tribes, and the strange newcomers to their land. I remember the last day the kids climbed me and sat with me, before their parents called them down, leaving me as they traveled from the strange new things that were fast approaching.

The strange people who the kids feared came. They made a settlement close to where I was. No one came to visit me, or to climb up to the top of the tree. It was lonely. Years passed, and a rocky trail started to form under me. A shepherd and his son were the only ones who traveled the path. They lived in a small house on a grassy slope, over looking a valley where they herded cattle of all sorts. It wasn’t long before a strong storm dropped me from the tree - my home - and became a simple nuisance that blocked the shepherd’s path to the village. I remember the son hauling me off to the side of the path, a small sturdy knife in his small hands as thin fingers moved in foreign ways with the knife. Two summers had passed until the boy had finished carving me. I didn’t look that bad, either. I had flaws, by I could perform the job the boy, now in his early teens, had wanted me to do. The boy’s father had disappeared from my view a summer ago. I remember this because the brown haired boy cried while he carved with the same small knife his father had given him. I then started my work with the boy in the fields, as he and I walked the path to town and back, where a young lady had caught my new friend’s interest. It was strange, how this boy could ramble for days about a single person. The children with the moccasins never did that. 

More and more years passed, and the weeping child who had created me grew into a young man, taking a striking resemblance to his father. The woman also grew tall as well, but she grew from a different land, where soil was more nutrient than the soil the boy who carried me. While my friend wore dirty sandals and worn clothing, she wore colors of the prettiest flowers I had ever seen from my perch up on the tree. They spoke during the time the young man spent in the town, and our visits to the market became more and more frequent. It was strange, really, when one day he stood with one knee on the ground, and how the lady had smiled. The children before them had never done that. I remember the two of them exchanging words, understanding from gestures and expressions that he was not the one she wanted. She didn’t want to be with him because of our work. To me, it made sense, a fern and a flower could never be together. But, somehow, the young man found a way to be a flower as well. Because he threw me away; left me by the familiar path we used to travel, to be someplace else with the flower that caught his eye. He never returned to me. It was lonely. 

I remember I was used as a walking stick by a wandering merchant, traveling north to the new settlements. But once I had supported him through the harsh claws of winter, he tossed me to the side of the road as well, before continuing on to his next destination. It was dark in early spring when I was handled again. Not by a man or woman, but by two small children, both with dark brown hair and eyes, the boy was young, only a few years younger than when I had been carved, a girl still not steady on her feet on the rocky dirty path, clinging to the boy’s large white shirt, the white sleeves rolled up to his small elbows, as growls and howls sounded closer. I remember the girl crying, a familiar dampness dripping down onto my body, as the flash of baring teeth and claws lashed out at them. I protected them until morning, where the girl smiled at the light, driving away the darkness and fear she had felt, while the boy had survived with only a scratch on his shoulder, never once shedding a tear. While the girl continued down the path, the boy paused, leaning me against a tree trunk, and for the first time, I was thanked for my work. I later learned the boy’s name was Jack, when his sister, Emma, hurried him away from me, continuing on their journey to a nearby town. 

It was every moon Jack came back to me, and yet, not daring to touch me. Simply watching to see if I had a home. But it three autumns later before Jack came back for me, finally reaching out to me, walking me to a new place I had never been. It was in a warm home with children gathered around was I used as a prop for make believe. With no adults in sight, the girl I had remembered, Emma, laughed as Jack walked up the makeshift stage, large moose horns held to his head, the laughter of children soon growing as time went by. At the time the last child went home, I expected to be left again, and yet, Jack placed me by a small pond, telling me he would be back for me. I shouldn’t have believed him, but I did.

It was after a large storm, two moons later, did Jack and Emma come back. They had strange shoes in hand and grins on their faces. I remember when Jack gave me to the small girl, as I helped her balance her unsteady feet on the newly formed ice on the pond. They had danced on the ice for hours, laughing and sometimes singing terribly off tune when things had gone sour. Emma had let go of me while she outstretched her arms, as if balancing on a rope, as sharp cracks started to form on the ice. I remember Jack slowly taking off his skates, pushing them to the side, out reaching his hands to calm his young sister. It was when he had grabbed my form, worn by weather and time, when in one graceful swoop had he managed to switch places with his beloved sister. It was the last time I ever saw Emma smile, before the ground beneath us dropped, the hole in the ice far too small for me to fit, as I slid away, only watching as the only person who had never truly left me alone, disappeared under the ice.

It was hours before Emma went home, her voice hoarse from screaming her brother’s name, begging him to swim to the surface. The only thing she brought home with her was the old pair of skates Jack had left behind, not bothering to look back at the pond as she trotted home. But, it wasn’t until night fell did something amazing happen. It was when Jack escaped the ice, pulled as if the moon had saved him, holding him in the air until his heavy breathing calmed. I remember when he grabbed me, the feeling of the coldest winter froze me solid, and yet a strange feeling of power coursed through me. It was strange, yet I didn’t complain - because I was with Jack again.   
He treated me well, even throughout three hundred passing winters did I never break by his hands, and even when I did, by the man in black, Jack fixed me. It was never boring, and never easy, but, it was fun. It was fun to be with my friend, who chased the loneliness away, and even though no one could see us, I truly did enjoy being with my friend, Jack Frost.


End file.
